In recent years, there have been used various kinds of clothes treating apparatus together with washing machines that wash clothes. For example, a drum type drying machine that dries washed clothes, a housing type drying machine that dries clothes while suspending the clothes, and a refresher that supplied dry air to clothes to refresh the clothes have been developed.
Among the clothes treating apparatuses, the refresher or the drying machine mainly heats air through the use of a heater and supplies the heated air to clothes. The heater may be classified as a gas heater that burns gas to heat air or an electric heater that heats air using electric resistance. In recent years, the electric heater has been widely used because the installation of the electric heater is convenient and the structure of the electric heater is simple.
However, when air is heated by the electric heater, high-temperature heat generated from the heater may be directly transmitted to clothes, with the result that the clothes may be damaged, and, furthermore, the interior of the clothes treating apparatus may be destroyed by fire.
Also, since the electric heater uses electricity to heat air, the electricity is excessively consumed to heat the air to a desired temperature, with the result that the maintenance costs of the electric heater are greatly increased.